Opinion

Mary Kelly: The look on the Trump family’s faces was a picture - here’s to speaking truth to power

Trump family’s reaction to Bishop Mariann Budde’s rebuke on Christian values of mercy was priceless

Mary Kelly

Mary Kelly

Mary Kelly is an Irish News columnist and former producer of current affairs output on Radio Ulster and BBC NI political programme Hearts and Minds

The Right Rev Mariann Budde led the national prayer service attended by President Donald Trump at the Washington National Cathedral (AP)
The Right Rev Mariann Budde led the national prayer service attended by President Donald Trump at the Washington National Cathedral (AP) (Evan Vucci/AP)

Wasn’t it a special moment to watch the faces of the Trump family when the mild-mannered Episcopalian Bishop Mariann Budde gave the new president a lesson in the Christian values of mercy and compassion for the underdog at his inaugural prayer service in Washington.

What a picture it was, looking at their dead-eyed expressions, trying to comprehend how anyone actually had the nerve to speak truth to power in such a way.

Then the notoriously thin-skinned Trump told reporters her sermon was boring, before taking to social media to call her nasty.

It was especially heartening that it was a woman cleric who delivered the message to his face, while all around him a court of obsequious billionaires queued up to pay him homage, like some sort of medieval king.

Guests including Mark Zuckerberg, Jeff Bezos, Sundar Pichai and Elon Musk in the Rotunda of the US Capitol in Washington (Julia Demaree Nikhinson, Pool/AP)
Guests including Mark Zuckerberg, Jeff Bezos, Sundar Pichai and Elon Musk in the Rotunda of the US Capitol in Washington (Julia Demaree Nikhinson, Pool/AP) (Julia Demaree Nikhinson/AP)

Is America really still a republic? As it’s fast starting to look like it’s ruled by one of those nutter emperors from the last days of the Roman empire.

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For bread and circuses, see instead the Sharpie felt-tips Trump threw out to his adoring followers after he used them to sign reams of executive orders, from pardoning January 6 insurrectionists, to removing the birth-right to US citizenship, to abolishing trans people.

Even though it does have its moments of sheer comedy, I fear the news from across the Atlantic is going to become increasingly unwatchable over the next four years. Is it still only January.

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In the mass hysteria that gripped England and Northern Ireland last summer, after the appalling murder of three little girls at a dance class in Southport, the worst dregs of humanity posed as outraged citizens online.

They instantly accused Keir Starmer, the country’s former chief prosecutor, of covering up for the killer even though he’d been swiftly arrested and was facing a criminal trial.

There were even absurd suggestions that the BBC was part of the conspiracy, trying to make the 17-year-old assailant “more innocent looking” by posting pictures of him as a schoolboy, even though, like all media outlets, they were using what they could get out quickly.

Court artist sketch of Axel Rudakubana
Axel Rudakubana

The keyboard warriors had already decided it was an Islamic terrorist attack by a Muslim migrant, which the police and government were trying to disguise to protect community relations.

This nonsense, spouted by some Reform politicians and others, led to rioting on the streets for days, exploited by the far right for their own nefarious purposes, while pretending to be concerned for the families of the victims.

Axel Rudakubana was British-born, and wasn’t Muslim, and when he changed his plea to guilty, a new hysteria gripped politicians and certain sections of the media.

This time for an immediate enquiry into why anti-terrorist agencies like Prevent, which investigated him several times, felt he didn’t meet their criteria as a politically-motivated risk.

The more obvious question is why a teenager, expelled from school after such violent aggression that social workers needed a police escort when interviewing him at his home, did not receive proper mental health care.

It might have led to either treatment for his mental problems, or confinement, which would have protected those little girls.

Flowers and tributes outside the Atkinson Art Centre Southport for the three girls
The victims of the Southport killings, Alice da Silva Aguiar, nine; Bebe King, six; and Elsie Dot Stancombe, seven

But the absence of proper mental health services in modern-day Britain after 14 years of sustained cutbacks in public services by the previous government doesn’t fit the bill for the hang-em-high brigade.

It’s little surprise that the Southport killer had earlier planned to launch an attack at his former school, which was ultimately foiled by his own father.



This kind of lone wolf attack is hard to legislate for, however many inquiries are held and whatever new regulations are introduced on knife ownership or violent internet videos.

Many of the school shooters in America operated below the radar before they launched their deadly attacks. Few had any ideology other than hate.

Rudakubana was no different. British society would be safer if it did more to stop people like him before they act out their murderous impulses.

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